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The need for change in how we think, behave and relate as organisations and individuals has never been greater. There is a great need for leaders who are capable of leading organisational change. The results to date have been dismal, research from Harvard Business Review indicates that as much as 70% of all organisational change programmes fail. The subject of change is vast and complex and I don’t claim to have all the answers, however I do feel that the following models provide useful insights, guiding how we should approacha and think about change.

The Paradigm Shift Model

Whilst reading “Whole-Scale Change: Unleashing the Magic in Organizations” I found this powerful formula that the authors call “The Paradigm Shift Model”. The model is based upon the work of Richard Beckhard, the formula describes what is required to bring about change in an organisation or in individuals. The formula is described as follows:

Each person in the organisation as a whole need to share a common “database” of dissatisfaction (D) with things as they are now. This requires that the organisation to do what Jack Welsh suggests, to “face reality as it is, not as it was or as you wish it were.” This is a very difficult task for most leaders. People also need a common vision (V) of what organisations needs to be in the future, and the people need agreement of what the significant organisational wide first steps (F) are that will move them in the required direction. If you look at the formula if any of the three elements D, V or F is zero, the drive for change will not be sufficient to overcome the resistance (R) to the change. This formula reminded me of the work of Robert Fritz who describes the necessary structures and tensions required to propel an organisation or individual towards change discussed in his book “Path of Least Resistance: Learning to Become the Creative Force in Your Own Life”

Structure Determines Behaviour

Organisational and individual change needs to be supported by the appropriate structure, Robert Fritz in his book “Path of Least Resistance: Learning to Become the Creative Force in Your Own Life” describes the importance structure:

“Once structure exists energy moves through that structure by the path of lease resistance. In other words, energy moves where it is easiest for it to go. The structure of anything refers to its fundamental parts and how those individual elements function in relation to each other and in relation to the whole….. Every structure contains within it the inclination towards movement, that is, a tendency to change from one state into another state…. Structure determines behaviour. The way anything is structured determines the behaviour within in that structure.”

This understanding of the importance of structure leads to the following insights:

• We go through life taking the path of least resistance.
• The underlying structure of your life determines the path of least resistance.
• You can change the fundamental underlying structure of your life.
• Some structures are more useful than others in leading to desired results.

We can recognise the structures at play in our organisations and lives then change them so that we create what we really want to create.

Structural Tensions

If we want to create change it’s necessary to have a structure that creates a path of least resistance by creating the necessary structural tension that moves the organisation or individual towards resolution. When creating a structure for change it requires two key components:

1. A clear view of current reality you now have.
2. A vision of the results you want to create.

As illustrated above, the discrepancy between what you now have and the results you want to create in the future creates a structural tension that seeks resolution. In creating the tension it’s necessary to hold the vision and not lower your standards and face reality as it is, any biased view of reality makes the tension difficult to form or maintain.

I think that these models are powerful tools for guiding how we create change in organisations and our lives. What are the structures and tensions in your life? Are they producing the positive results? Do you have a clear view of your current reality? Do you have a clear vision? Perhaps these are the reasons we’re not creating the results we seek in our organsations and our lives….?

Technorati Tags: Change, Leadership, Management, Business, OD, Organisational Change, Goals, Psychology, Book

Character is one of the key traits of practicing leaders. An article titled “CEOs say how you treat a waiter can predict a lot about character” in USA Today discusses how character is revealed in our every day situations. CEO’s agree that the manner in which people treat waiters reveals a great deal about their character, stating that:

“How others treat the CEO says nothing, they say. But how others treat the waiter is like a magical window into the soul.”

The CEO who first wrote about, what came to be known as the “waiter rule”, is Raytheon CEO Bill Swanson, in his booklet of 33 short leadership observations called Swanson’s “Unwritten Rules of Management“. One of Bill Swanson’s rules are “A person who is nice to you but rude to the waiter, or to others, is not a nice person.“, he goes on to say:

“Watch out for people who have a situational value system, who can turn the charm on and off depending on the status of the person they are interacting with….. be especially wary of those who are rude to people perceived to be in subordinate roles.”

The article gives some CEO examples, the one that stood out for me was this one:

Just about every CEO has a waiter story to tell. Dave Gould, CEO of Witness Systems, experienced the rule firsthand when a waitress dumped a full glass of red wine on the expensive suit of another CEO during a contract negotiation. The victim CEO put her at ease with a joke about not having had time to shower that morning. A few days later, when there was an apparent impasse during negotiations, Gould trusted that CEO to have the character to work out any differences.

“Leaders” who have a situational value system undermines trust and therefore, their ability to influence and lead others.

To lead with consistency requires that we live in alignment with our values, goals and actions. The book “Moral Intelligence: Enhancing Business Performance and Leadership Success” discusses the necessity of “living in alignment“, they emphasize the importance of alignment in three key areas, our moral compass, goals and behaviour, illustrated by the following diagram:

Living in alignment requires that we can answer the following questions:

• Morale compass: What do you value? What are your most important beliefs?
• Goals: What do you want to accomplish personally and professionally?
• Behaviour: What actions will allow you to achieve your goals?

To living in alignment we need to build our own personal view for each of these three frames.

I think that we spend too much time focused on what we are doing, when what we really need to be focused on is who we are becoming…. To live in alignment, to have a strong set of values and to be men and woman of character we need to act from a strong sense of who we are. Failing this we drift, overly influence by what media, resulting in a watered down version of ourselves. Never realising the potential that lives within us, we live by the expectations of others and fail to lead from who we are.

What others have said about character…

“Men are anxious to improve their circumstances, but are unwilling to improve themselves; they therefore remain bound”. - James Allen

“People of genius are admired. People of wealth are envied. People of power are feared. But only people of character are trusted.” - Arthur Friedman

“Character may be manifested in the great moments, but it is made in the small ones.” - Phillips Brooks

“Our character is basically a composite of our habits. Because they are consistent, often unconscious patterns, they constantly, daily, express our character.” - Dr. Stephen Covey

Technorati Tags: Personal Leadership, Leadership, Experience, Leadership Development, Personal Development, Management, Character, , Business, , Leadership, Values

The “The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership” by John Maxwell has become a leadership classic, found on every leaders bookshelf. John Maxwell is the founder and chairman of The INJOY and a world renown author of more than 30 books, with more than 7 million copies sold. Some of his best titles include:

• Thinking for a Change: 11 Ways Highly Successful People Approach Life and Work
• Developing the Leaders Around You: How to Help Others Reach Their Full Potential
• Developing The Leader Within You
• Failing Forward: How to Make the Most of Your Mistakes

Many of his titles have landed on the best seller list in publications such as the New York Times, Business Week, Wall Street Journal, USA Today, and CBA Marketplace. The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership surpassed the 1,000,000 shipped/sold mark early in 2003.

Overview

1. The Law of the Lid - Leadership ability determines a person’s level of effectiveness. Leadership ability is always the lib on personal and organisational effectiveness. Whatever you want to accomplish is restricted by your leadership ability.
2. The Law of Influence - The true measure of leadership is influence - nothing more, nothing less. If you don’t have influence you will never lead others. To change organisations you need influence. Leadership is not based upon holding position, leadership is about your ability to influence.
3. The Law of Process - Leadership develops daily, not in a day.Leadership is learnt over time, it’s the capability to develop and improve their skills that distinguishes leaders from their followers. Successful leaders are learners.
4. The Law of Navigation - Anyone can steer the ship, but it takes a leader to chart the course. Leaders have a vision for their destination, they understand what it will take to get there, they know who they’ll need on the team to be successful, and they recognise the obstacles long before they appear on the horizon.
5. The Law of E.F. Hutton - When the real leader speaks, people listen. Don’t listen to the claims of the person professing to be the leader. Instead, watch the reactions of the people around him. The proof of leadership is found in the followers. “Being in power is like being a lady - if you have to tell people you are, you aren’t.” - Margaret Thatcher
6. The Law of Solid Ground - Trust is the foundation of leadership. To build trust, a leader must exemplify these qualities: competence, connection, and character. Character makes trust possible. And trust makes leadership possible.
7. The Law of Respect - People naturally follow leaders stronger than themselves. People don’t follow other by accident. They follow individuals whose leadership they respect. Followers are attracted to people who are better leaders than themselves.
8. The Law of Intuition - Leaders evaluate everything with a leadership bias. Leadership depends on more than just the facts. Leaders see trends, resources and problems, and can read people. The law of intuition is based on facts plus instinct and other intangible factors. A leader has to read the situation and know instinctively what play to call. Leadership is more art than science.
9. The Law of Magnetism - Who you are is who you attract. Leaders are always on the look out for good people. In most situations you draw people to you who possess the same qualities you do. The better leader you are, the better leaders you will attract.
10. The Law of Connection - Leaders touch a heart before they ask for a hand. Effective leaders know that you first have to touch people’s hearts before you ask them for a hand. The heart comes before the hand. People don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care. To connect with people in a group relate to them as individuals. It’s the leader’s job to initiate connection with the people.
11. The Law of the Inner Circle - A leader’s potential is determined by those closest to him. A leader’s potential is determined by those closest to him. All great leaders have surrounded themselves with a strong inner circle.
12. The Law of Empowerment - Only secure leaders give power to others. The people’s capacity to achieve is determined by their leader’s ability to empower. “The best executive is the one who has the sense enough to pick good men to do what he wants done, and the self-restraint enough to keep from meddling with them while they do it” - Theodore Roosevelt.
13. The Law of Reproduction - It takes a leader to raise up a leader. More than four out of every five of all leaders that you ever meet will have emerged as leaders because of the impact made on them by established leaders who mentored them. People cannot give to others what they themselves do no possess. The potential of an organisation depends on the growth of its leadership.
14. The Law of Buy-In - People buy into the leader, then the vision. The leader finds the dream and then the people. The people find the leader, and then the dream. People don’t first follow worthy causes. They follow worthy leaders who promote worthwhile causes.
15. The Law of Victory - Leaders find a way for the team to win. Leaders believe that anything less than success is unacceptable. And they have no Plan B. That keeps them fighting.
16. The Law of the Big Mo - Momentum is a leader’s best friend. You can’t steer a ship that isn’t moving forward. It takes a leader to create momentum. Followers catch it. And managers are able to continue once it has began. But creating it requires someone who can motivate others, not who needs to be motivated. Getting started is a struggle, but once you’re moving forward, you can really start to do some amazing things.
17. The Law of Priorities - Leaders understand that activity is not necessarily accomplishment. Apply the Pareto Principle, If you focus your attention on the activities that rank in the top 20 percent in terms of importance, you will have as 80 percent return on your effort. As a leader, you should spend most of your time working in your areas of greatest strength.
18. The Law of Sacrifice - A leader must give up to go up. Sacrifice is a constant in leadership. “When you become a leader, you lose the right to think about yourself.” - Gerald Brooks
19. The Law of Timing - When to lead is as important as what to do and where to go. Only the right action at the right time will bring success. If a leader repeatedly shows poor judgement, even in little things, people start to think that having him as the leader is the real mistake.
20. The Law of Explosive Growth - To add growth, lead followers - to multiply, lead leaders. The key to growth is leadership. “It is my job to build the people who are going to build the company.” - John Schnatter. To go to the highest level, you have to develop leaders of leaders.
21. The Law of Legacy - A leader’s lasting value is measured by succession. Just as in sports a coach needs a team of good players to win, an organisation needs a team of good leaders to succeed. A legacy is created only when a person puts his organisation into the position to do great things without him.

Recommendation

What I liked most about this book is that the leadership insights are practical and can be used daily to improve our leadership ability. I feel that this book should be the required reading for all of us who are striving to become practicing leaders. I found the book to be easy to read and the examples provided were good, however, being a South African I sometime found it difficult to relate to the basketball and baseball examples used. I strongly recommend this book be read by leaders at all levels. The book creates a great foundation from which to build your leadership knowledge and begin your personal leadership journey.

Technorati Tags: Leadership, Habit, laws, Book, Book Review, Principle, Management, Business, Personal Development, Character, Christian

1. Control your own destiny or someone else will.
2. Face reality as it is, not as it was or as you wish it were.
3. Be candid with everyone.
4. Don’t manage, lead.
5. Change before you have to.
6. If you don’t have a competitive advantage, don’t compete!

Technorati Tags: Jack Welch, Leadership, Management, Business

This post from 43 Folders on the article “The 20 Minute Ultradian Healing Response” got me thinking. The article is an interview with Ernest Rossi author of “The Twenty Minute Break“.

In the interview Ernest Rossi talks about ultradian rhythms, a natural 90-120 minute rhythm of activity and rest that occurs in all of us and runs throughout the day. That’s all ultradian means - A rhythm taking place many times a day. Ernest Rossi describes how we can use our Ultradian rhythm to improve our productivity:

The basic idea is that every hour and a half or so you need to take a rest break - if you don’t you may be well on your way to the Ultradian Stress Syndrome: you get tired and lose your mental focus, you tend to make mistakes, get irritable and have accidents - If you continue to ignore your need to take a break you can experience more and more stress until you actually get sick……… When you learn how to recognize your need to take a 20 minute break you can convert your stress into what I call The Ultradian Healing Response - Its that wonderful feeling of comfort and well being that you naturally have when you are tired but let yourself have the freedom to take well deserved rest…….. There is an entirely new way of understanding what stress actually is! Stress is nature’s signal that we are getting too high on our stress hormones (eg. cortisol, adrenaline) and be need to take a healing break……. Taking a 20 minute healing break allows your mind and body to recover - it more than just a luxury to feel good! Your mind and body needs a chance to build up its internal supplies of available energy - to clear up the backlog of unfinished business and gear up for another hour and a half of good work, play and health…… Many really creative people throughout history - Leonardo da Vinci, Thomas Edison - have noted how their best inspirations seem to come after they have made a great conscious effort to solve a problem and then taken a break when they were initially frustrated with failure. Then after taking a break for a while - lo and behold - the new creative idea seems to pop into their conscious mind all by itself. Taking a 20 Minute Ultradian Break allowed their inner creative mind to work out the answer without outside interference……… In the typical 8 hour workday most people can expect to experience 4 or 5 peak periods when they are at their best in making decisions, planning and doing whatever they have to do. It therefore makes no sense for employers to try to get people to be busy every minute of the work day. The idea is to work smarter, not harder. Taking a 20 minute break every couple of hours or so allowing the mindbody to catch up with itself and create the ideas and energy that is needed to optimize the next work period.

This is similar to a previous post I wrote on how to “Stimulate Insights with the Relaxation Response” I have started experimenting by trying to become more aware of my “stress” levels and then take a 20 minute “recharge” break, so far it seems to be working well. I have also tried to use the relaxation response when learning or developing position papers and found it to be very effective. Has anyone else tries these techniques? What results have you experienced?

Technorati Tags: Leadership Practice, Personal Leadership, Leadership, Management, Leadership Development,GTD, Lifehack, PsychologyBook, Business

“When I was a young man, I wanted to change the world. I found it was difficult to change the world, so I tried to change my nation. When I found I couldn’t change the nation, I began to focus on my town. I couldn’t change the town and as an older man, I tried to change my family. Now, as an old man, I realize the only thing I can change is myself, and suddenly I realize that if long ago I had changed myself, I could have made an impact on my family. My family and I could have made an impact on our town. Their impact could have changed the nation and I could indeed have changed the world.” - Unknown Monk (1100AD)

Leaders take responsibility for initiating change and change begins in leaders first. Leaders are responsible for what they see. What changes do you see are needed in your country, your organisation, your home, your life? Be that change, live your vision, become the solution, be the living example……. Practice leadership…… Everyday….

Technorati Tags: Leadership, Management, Change, Quote, Influence

The Center for Creative Leadership (CCL) published an interesting article “Everyday Leaders, Everyday Leadership” discussing research they conducted into the lives of everyday leaders, people in home schools and communities. André Martin from CCL describing everyday leadership says:

“At CCL, we define leadership in terms of tasks, rather than role or position ….. Leaders are people who, in connection with others, accomplish the tasks of setting direction, building commitment and creating alignment.”

The Tasks of Leadership

CCL’s definition of an effective leader is someone who, in connection with others, is able to accomplish three key tasks of leadership:

• Setting direction. is the articulation of mission, vision, values and purposes. Key questions are: Where are we going? What are we going to do? Why are we doing it?
• Building commitment involves the creation of mutual trust and accountability, including addressing questions such as: How can we stay together? How can we work better as a group? What can improve cooperation?
• Creating alignment is about finding common ground and areas of interrelated responsibility. Effective leaders ask: How can we develop a shared understanding of our situation? How can our actions be better coordinated?

I liked this task view of leadership, it gets to the core of what is means to lead, everyday. Keeping focused on the key issues, everyday create and environment where great thigs can happen, where people are developed and where we all reach our potential, this is the essence of leadership.

Technorati Tags: Leadership, Personal Leadership, Management, Vision, Research, Vision, Task

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